Daniel Schauer
History 489
4-25-07
The Longest Bridge:
Religion, Ethnicity, and Milwaukee’s Civil Rights Movement,
1967-1968
Fr. Groppi leading a civil rights march, 1968. Reproduced with permission of the Wisconsin State Historical Society.
1
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter
I.
Introduction
3
II.
A Tale of Two Neighborhoods
8
III.
City of Steeples
15
IV.
The Real Enemy
24
V.
Milwaukee’s Inferno
32
VI.
A Bridge too Far?
39
VII.
Conclusion: The Most Segregated City
48
Bibliography
53
2
Chapter I- Introduction
Speaking at a civil rights march in Detroit in 1963, Martin Luther King observed,
“We must come to see that de facto segregation in the North is just as injurious as the
actual segregation in the South.”1 His words proved to be distressingly prophetic. Four
years later, the racial turmoil and violence that had plagued the South, that some may
have been able to dismiss as a southern issue haunting the old Confederacy and not
America as a whole, burst into the national consciousness in a series of riots in northern
cities. For Milwaukeeans looking eastward, it seemed that the intangible force of a riot
was marching towards them with great tempo and inevitability and before the summer
heat faded away, the pot would boil over in a local riot.
In the context of the 1967 riots, the civil rights movement, and in many ways the
turmoil of the 60’s in general, Milwaukee was a backwater, an unspectacular tributary
branching off the great torrents of upheaval and change. Sure enough though, Milwaukee
had the problems that King spoke of, which stemmed from, in the words of 1960’s
historian, Mark Lytle, “long-standing grievances,” and the fact that “all of the symptoms
of social pathology-overtly, crime, disease, and despair-were at worst in the black
ghettos.”2 However, traditionally, Milwaukee took its cues from the broader national
context not visa versa, it is hard to imagine Milwaukee’s riot taking place had it not been
for the riots in Detroit and Newark. In comparison though, Milwaukee’s riot almost
seems more a sideshow. Forty three died in Detroit, in Milwaukee, only four. The Detroit
Stanford University, “Landmark Speeches of Martin Luther King Jr.,”
http://www.stanford.edu/group/King/publications/speeches/Speech_at_the_great march_on_detroit.html
(accessed 19 February, 2007).
2
Mark Lytle, America’s Uncivil Wars: The Sixties Era from Elvis to the Fall of Richard Nixon
(New York: Oxford University Press, 2006), 230.
1
3
riot required police, National Guard, and paratroopers to suppress it, in Milwaukee no
federal forces were called in, National Guardsmen were called in but played only a
limited role. The riot was relatively small and largely contained by the police force.
The chapters in this paper will examine what the city of Milwaukee was like in
the 1960’s including the relationships between different groups, descendants of European
immigrants, and blacks, products of northern migration. Tied closely with examining
ethnic groups is a look at religion in the city, nicknamed, “the City of Steeples,” due to
the role of Catholicism in defining the community, and how changes in the Church
affected it. The civil rights movement’s progress in Milwaukee regarding school
desegregation and other issues will also be addressed. An event of great importance, the
July 1967 riot, its suppression, and aftermath will all be explored in detail. Finally, Fr.
Groppi, the young priest who became the face of movement, and his legendary open
housing marches into the segregated South Side, which altered the city in profound ways
to this day, will be examined.
Because events in Milwaukee were typically reactions to events in larger cities,
civil, police, state, and military, authorities had adequate time to craft a response to any
civil disturbance, which in some ways had become a local obsession. Civic leaders, led
by Mayor Henry Maier “began preparing for it fifteen months before it occurred by
working out elaborate contingency plans.”3 While calls for addressing the roots of the
problems in the inner-city were in fact given a sympathetic ear by the mayor, the media,
and many religious leaders, due to what had transpired in Watts, Newark, and Detroit;
3
David Boesel and Peter Rossi, eds. Cities Under Siege: A Anatomy of the Ghetto Riots, 19641968 (New York: Basic Books, 1971), 106.
4
such problems were put on hold. Dealing with the seeming immediacy and fear of an
apocalyptic riot dominated courses of action and public attention.
Demographics and history also shaped the course of the civil rights movement in
Milwaukee in important ways. Ethnic communities, be they Polish, German, Irish, etc.
were very much a part of the fabric of the city, and many ethnic neighborhoods were as
sharply defined in 1967 as they were in 1907.4 It was commonly joked that the 16th Street
Viaduct, a bridge over the Milwaukee River, was the “longest bridge in the world,”
because it, “linked Africa to Poland.”5 Even with the passage of time and with younger
generations having no tangible links to the homeland of their ancestors, ties to ones
culture and group were strong. While Milwaukee was, and is, often described as a very
“German” city, in the 1960’s, it was the Poles who represented the most recent wave of
immigration, around the turn of the century, and had the greatest sense of ethnic loyalty,
despite the fact they, too, had been established in Milwaukee for several decades and
thoroughly assimilated.
Prevalent in Milwaukee’s white-ethnic communities (Polish, and to lesser extents
Irish, German, Italian, and South-Slavic) was an old-school brand of clericalism and deep
devotion to the Roman Catholic Church, despite the fact that this was fading fast in other
northern cities. In the turbulence of the 1960’s, the rank-and-file of Milwaukee’s Polish
Catholics depended on the Church to be a pillar of stability in a sea of change. For Poles,
the Church had been the protector of the people during the centuries of Russian, Prussian,
and Austrian domination; it became the first safe harbor for them as new immigrants to
Wisconsin Cartographers’ Guild. Wisconsin’s Past and Present: a Historical Atlas (Madison:
University of Wisconsin Press, 1998), 33.
5
Richard Haney “Wallace in Wisconsin: The Presidential Primary of 1964,” Wisconsin Magazine
of History, 61 (1978): 259-267.
4
5
America, it was the rallying point of the community in terms of social clubs and schools.
Polish neighborhoods poured their resources into building grand, elaborate, churches, and
parochial schools. The very thought of leaving these parishes behind or sharing them with
outsiders was distressing. Milwaukee’s ethnic Catholics hoped to weather the 1960’s by
relying on the time-tested unity of community and Church.
Perhaps symptomatic of Milwaukee’s strong Catholicism, the man who became
the face and voice of the civil rights movement in the city was a priest, Fr. James Groppi.
On the surface, it may have seemed that Groppi, an ethnic-Catholic himself, as well as a
man with a passion for civil rights and social justice spawned by the Gospels, was
precisely the sort of figure who would be respected by all and could forge understanding,
and racial harmony. Indeed, with Fr. Groppi setting the pace, the civil rights movement in
Milwaukee gained steam. Unlike leaders who felt that the best way to deal with racial
issues was a strong police force, Groppi was a radical in the true sense of the term,
seeking to address the root causes of the city’s racial divide regarding housing, schooling,
and jobs. Groppi’s civil rights playbook contained some fairly standard fare, such as
pushing for school desegregation, and some more unorthodox efforts, such as going out
into the suburbs and picketing the homes of judges who belonged to organizations
lacking in racial diversity. His alleged involvement in the riot and his crusade for open
housing though would bring him into direct conflict with the South Side Catholics.
In forcing racial issues to the forefront of public consciousness though, Groppi
quickly emerged as the ultimate divider, a source of tension in a city marked by ethnic
divisions and religious devotion. To be sure, the slow and steady progress of the
movement and the credibility of Groppi were dealt a severe blow in the July 30, 1967
6
riot, setting the stage for confrontation between the civil rights activists and whites on the
South Side. Groppi and company did eventually change laws but were unsuccessful in
changing the attitudes of many.
This paper will utilize a variety of sources in an interdisciplinary manner. This
includes monographs relating to ethnicity in America, especially regarding Poles.
Monographs pertaining to civil rights and race riots to put Milwaukee in a broader
national context are used, as are scholarly articles relating to Catholicism with an eye on
changes in the Church resulting from the Second Vatican Council and the Church’s focus
on social issues in the 1960’s. Key among the sources to be used will be materials related
to James Groppi, including letters of support, and hate mail he received. Additionally,
memoirs by police will be used. Perhaps most important of the primary sources though
will be Milwaukee newspaper articles from the period which played a key role in
defining the riot and its aftermath to Milwaukeeans. Indeed, the day of the riot
Milwaukee papers were covered with headlines and pictures of the chaos in Detroit. The
next day, reporters would be able to print a local story. In the end however, it was not the
riot, but its aftermath, the open housing marches, which would define the civil rights
movement in Milwaukee to the present day.
7
Chapter II- A Tale of Two Neighborhoods
The popular image of Milwaukee, prior to the racial conflicts that rocked it in the
1960’s, though also to a certain extent still present in the popular imagination today, is
that it is a city defined by, “its peaceful small-town atmosphere, its provincialism, and its
Germanic heritage of honest government and good beer.”6 Reporting in the wake of the
July 1967 riot, Time certainly concurred with this perception, further describing the city
as, “traditionally well-disciplined.” Thus had it not been for the soul-searching that the
riot and civil rights movement demanded of Wisconsinites, the turmoil of 1967 would
have seemed a strange anomaly indeed.
Just as one must dig under the surface to understand why the black populace of
“disciplined” Milwaukee was so angry and increasingly impatient by the mid-60’s, one
must do similar digging to understand another vexing anomaly; why Milwaukee became
the “Selma of the North,” and one of the most segregated cities in the nation.7
Furthermore, one wonders, why is it that in Milwaukee the face of opposition to the civil
rights movement was not white-robed Klansmen, Confederate apologists, or even so
much browbeating police, but rather working-class Polish-American Catholics? Why did
a group, which one could hardly consider intimately tied to America’s history of slavery,
Civil War, Reconstruction, and Jim Crowe, allow its image of being hardworking,
faithful, community, and family oriented folks, to be tainted with such associations?
What prompted such actions as singing Dixie in Polish for segregationist candidate
George Wallace on a campaign swing through their neighborhoods, considering the
“Groppi’s Army," Time Magazine (26 September 1967)
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,941133,00.html (accessed 15 November, 2006).
7
Wisconsin Cartographers’ Guild, 27.
6
8
Menomonee River the “Mason-Dixon Line,” and greeting civil rights marchers with
burning effigies and chants of “We want slaves!”?8
As much as Milwaukee was the Deutsche-Athen (German Athens) in its history,
architecture, and culture; after World War II, “Milwaukee’s Germans suburbanized as
quickly as their recently purchased Fords and Chevys would carry them.”9 True enough;
in 1967 the city still had a strong German flavor and Mayor Henry Maier and other city
political and business elites proudly clung to their German-American identities, however,
in terms of strength of connection to the ethos of the Old World, the Poles had them
trumped. By and large, the Germans came to Milwaukee early and in great numbers,
facilitating quick prosperity. Anti-German stigmas, products of the two World Wars,
while obviously not oppressively harsh in Milwaukee, further accelerated the drive of
Germans out of their ethnic-enclaves, into the suburbs and anonymous Americanism.
As the German-Americans vacated their districts, blacks filled the void in the old
neighborhoods. “The movement of Negroes…coincides with the withdrawal of white
persons; these areas are inevitably the oldest and most deteriorated parts of the city.”10
These African-American North-side neighborhoods became known as “Core” and were
bisected by streets with names like by “Teutonia Avenue.” Also noteworthy is that Fr.
Groppi’s North-side parish was St. Boniface, named in honor of the patron saint of
Germany, famous for hacking down pagan altars with an ax and urging his followers to
accept martyrdom rather than use violence against their persecutors.
Wisconsin Cartographers’ Guild, 27.
Robert Ostergren and Thomas Vale, eds. Wisconsin Land and Life (Madison: University of
Wisconsin Press, 1997), 394.
10
Wisconsin State Historical Society, “The Housing of Negroes in Milwaukee: 1955,”
http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/turningpoints/search.asp?id=1098 (accessed 2 December, 2006).
8
9
9
The story of blacks in Milwaukee predates statehood. The city was a stop on the
Underground Railroad, and in the Antebellum Era the state as a whole had strong
abolitionist leanings. Though it is also worth mentioning that even in those early days,
animosity existed between white-ethnics and African Americans. During the Civil War,
“an Irish mob lynched an African American man.”11 Northern migration had been the
main source of black population growth in Milwaukee during the 20th century; spiking
during the World Wars and not slowing down in the post-war period. As whites moved
out and blacks moved in, the Core expanded northwards and westwards. By the 1960’s,
two-thirds of Milwaukee’s blacks had been born elsewhere, and 96% of them lived in the
deteriorating neighborhoods of the Core. While the Core grew, it was still quite compact
and geographic growth did not correspond with population growth, which went from
9,000 in 1940 to 62,000 in 1960.12 Consequently, while African-Americans had a
presence in the city for over a century by the 1960’s it had for much of the time prior
being a token one. Therefore, by 1967, like the Poles, blacks were a relatively new ethnic
group to the Milwaukee scene, living in a compact ethnic community, and often
competing for the same blue-collar jobs, and striving to improve their circumstances.
A 1955 report on housing in the Core painted a dismal picture of life there. In
every measure of success and prosperity, the African-American community was lagging
behind the rest of the city, from life expectancy, automobile ownership, income and
availability of hot water, right down to the number of electoral outlets in a residence. It
sympathetically concludes by attacking, “the prejudiced individual who insists that
Negroes be kept segregated…denies the Negroes the possibility to differentiae
Wisconsin Cartographers’ Guild, 27.
Ibid.
11
12
10
themselves through free and selective settlement and then insists that the homogenized
slum which results is because ‘they are all alike.’”13 It is hardly surprising that schools
and business reflected the pitiable housing conditions. In an interesting precursor to the
social justice emphasis of Catholicism which would come to the front-burner in the
1960’s, embodied by figures like Groppi, the 1955 study, essentially a plea for change
and action, was headed up professors and nuns from Marquette University and Alverno
College, with sociology students doing much of the leg-work.
One thing both Poles and African Americans may have agreed upon was that
compared to the Core, the South Side represented a slice of the American dream. Blacks
were eager to have the right to leave the slums and live there, and Poles felt that such
intrusions from outsiders would lead to a paradise lost. Half a century prior to 1967
however, the South Side was not so different from the Core. A state health report on the
area, which prior to Polish settlement had been an undesired and underdeveloped void,
oozed with prejudice, commenting that, “the Hebrew and the Slav, according to popular
belief, are poisoning the pure air of our otherwise well regulated cities, and if it were not
for them there would be no filth and no poverty… The 12th and 14th wards are more than
any others of the region of the modern cave dwellers.”14 Just as blacks were funneled into
the dilapidated old German neighborhoods, Poles were funneled into the unattractive
desolate southern areas of the city.
Polish immigrants, typically lacking any skills beyond farming, had no choice but
to take dangerous unskilled labor jobs and a subordinate position to the city’s Anglo and
German elite. Common derogatory epithets used against the Poles included, “Pollack,”
Wisconsin State Historical Society, “The Housing of Negroes in Milwaukee: 1955,”
http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/turningpoints/search.asp?id=1098 (accessed 2 December, 2006).
14
Ostergren and Vale, 278.
13
11
“Hunky,” and “Slav.” In the first half of the 20th Century, Poles, like Irish and Italians,
had to contend with xenophobic and anti-Catholic prejudices, which occasionally
morphed into hysterias. Despite these tribulations, the response of the South Side
community was to fervently assert their American patriotism while still taking great pride
in their Polish identity. This was not too difficult considering that supporting the Polish
nation was synonymous with supporting Allied victory in both world wars. American
identity was best expressed in wartime. The flags went up, stars-and-stripes and blue
flags “that carried a star for each of the neighborhood’s American fighting boys.” In
1967, with the Vietnam War raging, it was observed that South Side boys didn’t go to
college, they went into the military.15 An indication of the strength of the Polish identity
is that Polish-Americans born in the span from 1931-1945, 45.5% spoke Polish in the
home, even for those born between 1946 and 1960 a still substantial number, 24.9% were
raised speaking Polish.16 Parochial schools and cultural clubs further ensured that the old
language had a place in the community.
By the 1960’s, the Polish-American community had truly emerged from a past of
being the victims of prejudice and discrimination, though the shadow of those days still
loomed large. Another haunting specter of times past was Poland’s own troubled history.
Older Poles recalled a time prior to the treaty of Versailles when their nation did not
appear on maps; it had been partitioned by the Prussian, Austrian, and Russian Empires
and suffered under their heavy yokes. Even worse was Poland’s more recent past of Nazi
and then Communist control. The result of this history of subjection was that, “a sense of
15
David Maraniss. They Marched Into Sunlight: War and Peace Vietnam and America October
1967 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1999), 103.
16
Roediger, 154.
12
oppression in Poland,” existed among Polish-Americans, “even into the third and forth
immigrant generations.”17
With some fairness, the old Polish South Side in its post-World War prosperity
heyday is often remembered as quite idyllic. Blue-collar life was hardly without its
struggles, but the strides Milwaukee’s Polish community had made were astounding,
seemingly exponential with each generation further removed from the homeland. Home
ownership was vital and rates of it were extremely high. It was noted that the “Poles
desire for property ranked them highest among Milwaukee’s ethnic groups in terms of
residential ownership.”18 Houses and yards, though small, were often picturesque and
treated as the embodiments of the American Dream that they were. Many homes were
inhabited by a young family, with a small section reserved for grandparents. In a nod to
their agrarian past, few yards were complete with a tidy garden, and some yards even had
livestock, rendering each Polish-American home not just a workingman’s residence, but a
productive little hobby-farm.19
The economic heart of the South Side was Mitchell Street, the “Polish
Downtown.” Another important local landmark was Kosciuszko Park, named for the
Polish hero of the American Revolution and a favorite gathering spot. It was a necessary
stop for any politician campaigning for Polish votes, including Lyndon Johnson. The
real crown jewels of the neighborhood though were the churches. There were many but
the most notable were St. Stanislaus and the great domed basilica of St. Josephat, the
largest church in the archdiocese. The grand exteriors and ornate interiors of these
17
Roediger, 104.
Ostergren and Vale, 279.
19
Maraniss, 105.
18
13
buildings spoke greatly of the neighborhood’s priorities while not revealing the relative
poverty of the first generation of immigrants that built them.
Animosity between the Polish and African Americans was, in the early days, a
foreign concept to both communities. In the beginning, Polish attitudes towards blacks
were simply indifferent. In 1920’s race riots in Chicago, the Polish community stayed
neutral, viewing it as fight between WASPs and blacks, none of their concern.
Indifference quickly gave way to antagonism though. The upwardly mobile Poles bought
into the belief that their group would “have to develop its self-image…in more or less a
conscious counterpoint to the stereotype of the ‘nigger-scab.’ Poles who had so little
going for them except their white skin…stressed the image of the black scab in order to
distinguish themselves from the blacks with whom they shared the bottom of American
society.”20 Thus from the earliest days of immigration, the seeds for what would become
the briars of racial intolerance in 1967, had been planted.
20
Roediger, 15.
14
Chapter III- The City of Steeples
It is easy to understand why Milwaukee is often referred to as the, “City of
Steeples.” The skyline is short on high-rise commercial buildings, but well enough
populated by the rising towers of churches. It seems, in the streets of Milwaukee, one is
never far from the shadow of a church. Likewise, for Milwaukee Catholics in the 1960’s,
the local church never seemed far from the vast shadows being cast from Rome where the
Second Vatican Council was convening, and preparing, arguably, the most significant
changes for them since the Council of Trent. For much of American history, the Church
had been both a great monolith. This image was formed in light of the fact that the
faithful seemed to march in lockstep with their leaders, when bishops spoke on issues of
faith and morals, they were speaking for tens of thousands. This sort of unity and
cohesion had in fact been one of the primary fears of nativists in the 1850’s and beyond.
American Catholics, on the surface, were the very picture of obedience and loyalty. Half
jokingly, their mantra was referred to as, “pay, pray, obey (and stay).”
There was, however, voices of dissent, fast becoming a crescendo, in the ranks of
this united front. The sweeping changes of the Vatican Council in Rome were quickly
changing the playing field, and the rules, of religion. It was on this new and unfamiliar
ground that different Church factions would duke it out over the issue of the day, civil
rights. Thus what transpired was, “between 1964 and 1967 two distinctly Catholic
visions of church, community, and authority, clashed in the streets, parishes, and Catholic
schools of northern cities. More traditional Catholics resisted what they perceived as the
destruction of their communities…Catholic liberals on the other hand, questioned the
15
traditional parochial structures while becoming active participants in local civil rights
coalitions.”21 Nowhere was this more apparent than in Milwaukee.
In its embrace of the modern world, the Vatican Council seemed to be lending its
support to liberal Catholics, clergy and laymen alike, who had felt that, the parochial,
hierarchical, and ethnically polarized, parish structure, needed an overhaul, something of
a reformation. Milwaukee for example, in addition to its Polish parishes on the South
Side, had “Italian,” “Irish,” “German,” and “Croatian,” parishes in other areas. While this
had been a dominant, and popular, tradition since the early days of immigration, “the
American church had long perceived this to be at odds with its own self-image as a
miniature melting pot.”22 The time was ripe for a clash between conservatives who saw
the Church as their neighborhood parish, built by the sweat of their ancestors’ brows, and
liberals, who saw the Church not as building or hierarchy, but as a force for social
change. These were people who felt more at home singing the hymns of social protest
than in the tongues of the old world and marching for civil rights, rather than in Marian
processions. Indeed, it was to the point that, “For activist clergy…the definition of a
successful parish became its ability to address social justice issues,” and, “Better
educated progressives were uncomfortable about the vestiges of ethnic loyalty still felt by
laggard elements in the Catholic population.”23
1965 proved to be the fulcrum year on which the Church turned. It was that year
that many of the Council’s directives, liturgy in the vernacular, and the priest facing the
John T. McGreevy, “Racial Justice and the People of God: The Second Vatican Council, the
Civil Rights Movement, and American Catholics,” Religion and American Culture, Vol. 4, (Summer,
1994): 221-254.
22
D.E. Pienkos. “Politics, Religion, and Change in Polish Milwaukee, 1900-1930,” Wisconsin
Magazine of History, 61 (1978): 179-209.
23
Philip Gleason, “Catholicism and Cultural Change in the 1960’s,” The Review of Politics,
(1972): 91-107.
21
16
congregation, among them, went into effect. In the Polish parishes, the high Baroque
altars and austere communion rails were preserved as if they were waiting out a fad,
waiting for the Church to return to its senses. Fr. James Groppi, the son of Italian
immigrants, who had been a zealous crusader for the cause of Civil Rights ever since
working with poor blacks as a seminarian, took a much different approach. His North
Side parish, St. Boniface, quickly gained a reputation for lively and contemporary
ecumenical worship, where old traditions were out and Gospel spirituals, hand clapping
and even dancing during Mass was in. Much of this was, in Groppi’s view, an effort to
acknowledge realities; the future of St. Boniface was not the remaining meager handful
of German-Americans who founded the parish, but rather the African-Americans who
dominated neighborhood demographics. Groppi’s groundbreaking pastoral initiatives
were supported by his immediate superior, Fr. Eugene Blediorn who observed that, “The
time is now to prove that the Catholic Church is not a white Church which happened to
located within a Negro ghetto.”24 Indeed, “Liberals linked Groppi’s program with
Vatican calls to reinvigorate the church.”25
Groppi’s irreverent disregard for the old liturgy, and the pushing of the
boundaries of Councilor changes, were not well received in other camps. An organization
of self described blue-collar Catholic men wrote him, warning that “Rebellion is the
primary tenet of communism.” Even harsher was a letter from a former white parishioner
at St. Boniface who protested, “Whites have been chased out of their homes by Negroes,
John T. McGreevy, “Racial Justice and the People of God: The Second Vatican Council, the
Civil Rights Movement, and American Catholics,” Religion and American Culture, Vol. 4, (Summer,
1994): 221-254.
25
Ibid.
24
17
and now you are desagrating [sic] the church they built.”26 Traditionalists were angry
enough with what Groppi was doing at St. Boniface, that it is no surprise what rage they
would muster when he burst from influencing his parish to the national Catholic scene!
They anxiously waited for ecclesial authorities, in the form of Archbishop of Milwaukee,
William Cousins, to reign in the impertinent young priest.
For the conservatives, early signs were promising. The Archbishop seemed to be
adopting a strategy similar to that of his colleges in the Boston hierarchy, maintaining
“neutrality,” in the civil rights arena. In practice, this protected traditional ethnic
enclaves, be they Irish in south Boston or Poles in south Milwaukee, from liberal
activism. This policy resulted in the archdiocese blocking a group of priests from joining
in the 1963 March on Washington, considering such actions to be “rash and
imprudent.”27 In 1965 however, the Bishop did not stand in the way of Groppi joining in
Civil Rights protests in Selma; Groppi in turn, was joined by a handful of liberal priests
and nuns from across the country, giving a very visible Catholic presence to the Civil
Rights movement. The experience convinced Groppi that civil rights was the great moral
issue of the age, and that it was his duty to fight for them in Wisconsin just as he had
done in the Deep South, a view he voiced three years later when he informed CBS news
cameras that, “Clergymen have a responsibility to become involved in politics, if there is
violation of Christian teaching in the political order.”28
Groppi’s policies at St. Boniface, and activities in Selma were one thing. His new
crusade for Civil Rights and church reform in Milwaukee was quite another. Fr. Groppi
26
Ibid.
John T. McGreevy, “Racial Justice and the People of God: The Second Vatican Council, the
Civil Rights Movement, and American Catholics,” Religion and American Culture, Vol. 4, (Summer,
1994): 221-254.
28
Milwaukee Journal, 18 September 1967, p. 1.
27
18
skyrocketed to fame as “the most publicized white leader in the black revolution”29
Groppi had urged blacks to boycott segregated schools and set up a “Freedom School” at
his parish. As had been the case in 1963, Church authorities intervened, halting Groppi’s
activities, worried that telling children to boycott school was sending the wrong message.
Perhaps he was ready to start taking orders and cool down, but the firebombing of the
NAACP office by the KKK, only two blocks from St. Boniface, redoubled Fr. Groppi’s
resolve to get involved.30 He turned his sights on passing an open housing ordinance; his
target would be the all-white, mostly Polish, mostly Catholic, South Side. Time declared
that “Groppi leaped into the issue like an avenging angel.”
Groppi had harsh, thinly veiled, words for his brother priests on the South Side
who were growing worried by his increasingly radical initiatives. Groppi called them out,
embarrassing them in the media by referring to their refusal to preach on the issue as
“cowardice.”31 Groppi no doubt felt frustrated that the South Side priests were not living
up to what he saw as their duty to fight segregation. In theory, it was reasonable to
assume that South Side priests could have accomplished Groppi’s goals; after all, the
priests there represented the community’s best and brightest. “Among the Poles,
clergymen played a far more important role as community leaders then they did among
non-Poles, who tended to be dominated by lawyers, businessmen, and other professional
persons.”32 Surely it was to Groppi’s great dismay when a South Side priest, Father
Witon, openly sided with community members against Groppi.
29
Philip Gleason, “Catholicism and Cultural Change in the 1960’s,” The Review of Politics,
(1972): 91-107.
30
Wisconsin Cartographers’ Guild, 78.
31
Milwaukee Journal, 18 September 1967, p. 1.
32
D.E. Pienkos. “Politics, Religion, and Change in Polish Milwaukee, 1900-1930,” Wisconsin
Magazine of History, 61 (1978): 179-209.
19
In a South Side rally, Witon spoke out saying, “We as individuals have the right
to stand up for what we believe in. If he (Groppi) has the right to march for his
convictions we have the same right…we are willing to stand up and fight.” It was even
rumored that Fr. Witon had declared opposition to “letting anybody who is black come to
the South Side,” though he ardently denied this. Witon did, however, chastise folks at the
rally who, “use such words as ‘nigger’ and ‘jig’ and phrases such as ‘Father Groppi’s got
to go.” Fr. Witon repeated what was becoming a common refrain for respectable
conservatives, clergy and laymen; they were not opposed to civil rights, but rather, to
Groppi’s methods. After speaking, Fr. Witon led residents to various South Side churches
in a prayerful procession.33 Witon’s words and actions however proved to be an
expectation, rather than the rule. Priestly opposition to Groppi and civil rights was almost
never vocal or overt; rather it often came in the form of silence and omission. At a
banquet honoring Archbishop Cousins, the absences of eight South Side Priests was
glaring, and newsworthy, as was the fact that Groppi did not show either. The 400 priests
present tried to alleviate the situation with humor; one suggested that future celebrations
should be transferred, “to a good old solid German parish like St. Boniface. That’s where
the action is.”34 The next day a younger crowd rallied in the South Side against Groppi.
No doubt following Fr. Witon’s example, they “stopped in front of churches to offer
silent prayers ‘for the rehabilitation of Father Groppi.’” The young men also pledged
non-violence in the future and in no uncertain terms told out of town neo-Nazis who had
been joining the anti-Groppi protests to stay out of the South Side.35
33
Milwaukee Journal, 14 September 1967, p. 18.
Milwaukee Journal, 16 September 1967, p. 14.
35
Milwaukee Journal, 15 September 1967, p. 2.
34
20
Still, the damage had been done. Even if South Side clergy were personally
opposed to racism and segregation, “Catholic parishes had sanctified particular
neighborhoods, fostering a territorial sense of community thought the urban North.”36
The tight-knit parish centered community which they, and to a greater extent their
predecessors, had cultivated, had created a siege mentality among ethnic Catholics.
“Defense of the parish, of the city within the city by immigrant groups, and of the allwhite neighborhood thus matured together…Identification with whiteness would
eventually turn on the defense of home and neighborhood…due to the fact that blacks
were also distrusted because they were overwhelmingly Protestant, it is unsurprising that
rank-and-file Catholics and their parish leaders often aided agitation to keep
neighborhoods white.” 37 In other words, practices and attitudes which had begun in the
1800’s as a defense and support system against anti-Catholicism and xenophobia had, by
the 1960’s morphed into a reactionary backlash against civil rights, accentuated by
Groppi’s combative, with-me-or-against-me approach. Many folks who did not
particularly care for racism or segregation still opposed Groppi and his marchers since
they saw them as the vanguards of the demise of the church and community that had,
been everything to many South Siders.
Catholics on both sides in Milwaukee became increasingly impatient, and
suspicious of each other, disagreements were escalated with the passions that only
religion can provide. Traditional minded-Milwaukee Catholics, hurt and confused by
changes in society and religion, wrote to Groppi. One women suggested that in these
John T. McGreevy, “Racial Justice and the People of God: The Second Vatican Council, the
Civil Rights Movement, and American Catholics,” Religion and American Culture, Vol. 4, (Summer,
1994): 221-254.
37
Roediger, 169.
36
21
tumultuous times, he retreat from politics and return to the old devotions, “March for
something like the Blessed Lady instead of all the mess you are bringing down on us
Catholics.” Another letter writer felt betrayed, telling Groppi that, “You are supposed to
have a divine vocation directed by Heaven and yet, when the chips are down, you
succumb to the thinking of a bunch of radical low-lifes!” One man wrote in, still bitter
about Groppi’s trip to Selma, saying it “allowed, ‘communist leaders…to divide the
Catholic population…segregation, birth control and civil rights are issues that are held
up…in order to destroy unity.” 38
On the other hand, a visiting Boston priest sided with Groppi and fired back that,
“(Groppi had) unmasked the hypocrisy of the lily-white Catholic community….As
Milwaukee is the prophetic voice of our nation today, so St. Boniface is the prophetic
voice of the Church.”39 Other liberal Catholic intellectuals were asking, “Whether
national parishes really foster vibrant Christianity or merely preserve ethnic identity and
thereby promote racial discrimination?” Describing a similar situation going on in
Chicago at the time, one liberal Catholic wrote, “The Civil Rights issue may…represent
the possible loss of a home, the transformation of a familiar neighborhood into a ghetto, a
threat to family , community and, not least of all, to the Church itself…They consider
themselves good Catholics, yet utterly reject integration. And they are particularly bitter
towards priests, bishops and organizations who tell them they are in conflict with their
religion. ‘Since when?’ they retort.” 40
38
John T. McGreevy, “Racial Justice and the People of God: The Second Vatican Council, the
Civil Rights Movement, and American Catholics,” Religion and American Culture, Vol. 4, (Summer,
1994): 221-254.
39
Ibid.
40
Ibid.
22
Polish conservative Catholics had spoken, the silence of their clergy spoke
volumes, and Fr. Groppi and his allies were shouting their message loud and clear. All
eyes turned to Archbishop Cousins as Milwaukee became not only a political, and racial,
but religious battleground. Both liberals and traditionalists anxiously looked to, appealed
to, and demanded from Cousins, action and support. The stakes had seemingly risen as
the high as the steeple of the Archbishop’s cathedral itself.
23
Chapter IV-The Real Enemy
In Archbishop William Cousins, Father Groppi had found a powerful ally, and yet
at the same time, a cautious, reluctant, and restrained one. Cousins was a Chicago native
who was appointed Archbishop of Milwaukee in 1958. His reputation as a jovial and
kindly leader preceded him, and he was greeted upon arrival in Milwaukee by hundreds
of cheering supporters at the train station. It must have been impossible for any spectator
to that scene to foresee the controversies that would rock Milwaukee’s Catholic
community less than a decade later. Not long after his arrival, the popular new
Archbishop was called away to Rome to join in the Second Vatican Council.41 In
Cousins’ absence, control of the archdiocese was entrusted to the Auxiliary Bishop,
Roman Atkielski.
Atkielski had been the de-facto leader of the Church in Milwaukee for many years
prior to Cousins’ arrival, more-or-less, taking charge of Church affairs when Archbishop
Kiley was “immobilized by deteriorating health,” in the mid 1940’s.42 Atkielski,
surprisingly one of the first, and few, prelates of Polish descent in the United States at
that time, comfortably resumed the helm. He took his cues from Cousins’ initial attitude
of “neutrality” in civil rights issues, most notably the blocking of priests from going to
the March on Washington in 1963. He defaulted upon the old-school absolutist leadership
style, and respect for ethnic parishes, that had for so long held sway in the city. As the
60’s transpired, Cousins and the Council deliberated upon doctrines in Rome. Back in
Milwaukee, however, the situation was changing rapidly, in ways unimaginable in 1958.
41
Archdiocese of Milwaukee, "Former Archbishops: Archbishop William E. Cousins,"
http://www.archmil.org/bishops/bishopcousins.asp (accessed 24 March, 2007).
42
Archdiocese of Milwaukee, "Former Archbishops: Archbishop Moses Elias Kiley,”
http://www.archmil.org/bishops/bishopkiley.asp (accessed 24 March, 2007).
24
In 1966, the Milwaukee United School Integration Committee (MUSIC) launched
boycotts of the public school system, demanding integration. “Some clergymen were
arrested for symbolically blockading the schools,” including Fr. Groppi who was part of a
human chain blocking vehicles at a construction site where a new school was being
built.43 Bishop Atkielski was becoming increasingly alarmed by the behavior of Fr.
Groppi and a handful of other priests and nuns who were becoming progressively more
active in protest movements.
The rank-and-file Catholic community of Milwaukee did not feel a pressing need
to get involved in the school integration controversy. After all, they had, without
complaint, been fully supporting their own parallel system of parochial schools while still
upholding their obligations to pay taxes for the public school system. Fr. Groppi though
had thrust the issue into their consciousness, acting in concert with the priests of
Milwaukee’s five inner city, “black,” parishes. He declared that all the facilities on their
church properties could function as “freedom schools,” places for black children to go
and learn while the boycott of the public school system was in effect. A spokesman for
the Bishop warned that if Groppi and company proceeded with it, they would be in
“direct disobedience of the ecclesiastical authority.”44 A day into the boycott, an angry
and shaken Bishop Atkielski summoned Groppi to his office and ordered him to fall into
line explaining that, “If I break the law, or allow others to break a law, what kind of
authority will I have?”45 All the activist priests involved reluctantly complied.
Wisconsin Cartographers’ Guild, 78.
Myron Ratkowski, What Really Happened: A Police Report (Milwaukee: Nine Mugwump
Publishers, 2003), 20.
45
Ibid.
43
44
25
Bishop Atkielski’s heavy-hand had forced a victory, but it was a Pyrrhic one.
Even Myron Ratkowski, a conservative Polish-American Catholic, police captain, and
Groppi critic, commented that, “the Bishop showed contempt for the prudent work in the
civil rights movement and its complexities.”46 Liberal Catholics and civil rights leaders
were irate with the bishop’s authoritarianism. A group of faculty at Marquette University,
the local Catholic intelligentsia, so to speak, issued a statement on civil rights, which
among other declarations, said that protests “can involve some dramatic action which
would incidentally bear with it a violation of a law.”47 In effect, the declaration claimed
that the moral law can, in select circumstances, take precedence over civil laws. Then, in
a previously unheard-of show of defiance, a group of about 125 protestors from
Marquette, consisting of faculty, including some priests and nuns, as well as students,
picketed in front of the Bishop’s residence in response to his suppression of clergy from
participating in the “Freedom Schools” and boycott.48
Upon Archbishop Cousins’ return from the Vatican Council it was apparent that
not only had the situation in Milwaukee changed, but so had the Archbishop himself. He
had been energized by the council’s new ideas and calls for a renewed focus on social
justice. Also, he indicated sympathy for Groppi’s activism. Bishop Atkielski quietly
faded into the background; his influence over Cousins was diminished and clearly,
Groppi’s days of taking orders from Atkielski had come to an end. With every picket,
protest, speech, and rally, Groppi’s fame was spreading, increasingly putting the
46
Ratkowski, 19.
Marquette Faculty Association for Interracial Justice, “Marquette University Statement on Civil
Rights,” 20 October 1966.
48
Ratkowski, 19.
47
26
Archbishop in a more and more precarious position. The July 31 riot provided a bountiful
windfall of rhetorical ammunition for opponents of Groppi.
Whether or not Groppi had any role in encouraging the riot, it would have been
fair to expect that in the wake of such violence and destruction, he would lay low, let the
situation cool off a bit. Fr. Groppi, however, felt that rather than stain the reputation of
the movement, the riot had forced it to the forefront, and compelled whites to reflect upon
Milwaukee’s racial issues. The smoke and tear gas of July had scarcely dissipated when
Groppi began his campaign to force an open housing ordinance through the political
pipeline, targeting the all white South Side with a campaign of marches. The tight-rope
Cousins had been walking was getting thinner. While the Polish community had indeed
adamantly been maintaining an all-white neighborhood, they had been content to stay out
of the fray in the Church and city, as long as they were left alone, now that was all about
to change. Groppi had no intention of following the Archbishop’s cautious example; he
was prepared to rattle a sleepy hornet’s nest into an angry swarm.
Two nights of marches into the Polish neighborhoods, beginning August 28,
1967, had revealed an ugly, previously unseen, face of the South Side community, and
the Archbishop was compelled to speak on the matter. Appearing on television, he mildly
criticized some of what Fr. Groppi and the Youth Council had done claming that “rights
are neither gained nor retained by a disregard for the rights of others.” Furthermore,
Cousins deemed that while the first march had called attention to a real civil rights issue,
“a second night of demonstrations, therefore, served little or no purpose.” Despite the
Archbishop’s opinion on the folly of a second march, Groppi planned to continue such
demonstrations indefinitely; over two-hundred more would follow! The Archbishop
27
focused most of the rest of his speech on the South-Siders. He admonished the large
numbers of folks who reveled “latent prejudices,” and whose “jeering and verbal abuses
turned into bottle throwing and physical threat.” He attacked the “thousands
gathered…engaged in a dangerous satisfying curiosity,” who by their very presence had
increased the tension, and gave credit to “residents who minded their own business.”49
Right or wrong, Groppi was unquestionably a catalyst in Milwaukee for strong
feelings and even violence. The Archbishop had tried to maintain duel respect for the
feelings of conservative and Polish Catholics as well as the civil rights activists with
whom he sympathized. Both sides though were trying the patience of Cousins. The angry
crowds of South Siders, turning to violence and racist ideology, were clearly out-of-line
with Church teachings on social justice, and an embarrassment to Catholics at large. Yet
at the same-time, that community had always championed orthodoxy and the place of the
Church in their society, supporting it financially with great sacrifice if need be, and by his
office, Cousins was to be an advocate, and shepherded so to speak, for that community.
The civil rights activists on the other hand, while not necessarily Catholic, or even
religious at all, were indeed, in-line with the social justice values that had been
emphasized by the Vatican Council and which were near and dear to Cousins’ heart, and
yet at the same time, they had exhibited tendencies for flagrant disregard of both police
and Church authority. They had adopted a no-compromise rhetoric that was so rigid that
it may have been, in fact, undoing its own progress, not unlike building up a tower by
taking stones from the base and putting them on the top. Siding with Groppi had been
hard enough before the riot; afterwards, with even liberal leaders like Mayor Maier
publicly and vocally losing faith in the civil rights movement, it took real guts to do so.
49
Ibid, 99.
28
To Cousins’ credit though, that was exactly what he ended up doing. Totally shedding his
earlier position of “neutrality,” he emerged as a whole-hearted supporter of the civil
rights movement, though with more restraint and patience, in dealing with South Siders
and other opponents than Groppi had been.
At the same time, as the fury of the open-housing marches intensified, Cousins
was displaying a new kind leadership, less hierarchical than Bishop Atkielski had once
exhibited. A September summit of priests sheds light on the direction Cousins was going
on the issue. He was viewing his role as Archbishop, less and less as a supreme authority,
and more and more as “part of a team,” and, he opined, that, “the right to disagree was
part of the life of the Church.”50 He strongly requested, though did not compel, that the
priests of the diocese join him in supporting Groppi.
While not all priests where with him regarding Groppi and civil rights, the next
day it became clear that a strong majority were. In the wake of the summit, the priests’
senate voted 21 to 7, “to support William E. Cousins in refusing to take action against
Father James E. Groppi, a militant civil rights leader.” While some priests argued that
Groppi’s “methods and techniques,” were “imprudent and too provocative.” For the most
part, the priests’ senate had adopted the social justice and civil rights mantra that Cousins
had brought back with him from Rome, and Groppi had been toting all along. In their
official statement of support the priests said that, “the tenor of the times demands urgency
and outspoken frankness…Social revolutions do not wait for calm committee action.
Father Groppi’s actions have turned the spotlight on a degree of community apathy.”51
50
51
Milwaukee Journal, 15 September 1967, p.1.
Milwaukee Journal, 16 September 1967, p. 1.
29
Still, in the spirit of anti-Groppi priest Fr. Witon’s comments against open
housing and declarations that if Groppi and NACCP were going to march, so would
South Siders, 650 neighborhood whites marched on the Archbishop’s house to demand
he discipline Groppi. Cousins refused to see the mob, but promised to “consider its
demands.” The next day the scene was repeated. This time, Cousins emerged with a
bullhorn and challenged the crowd; he warned them that they were, “being diverted by
emotion and mob psychology into fighting a straw figure while the real enemy goes
unscathed.”52 The Archbishop exhibited such eloquence that the mob’s anger gave way to
applause and the marchers peacefully left the area.
Cousins had struck a chord and at last found his voice in the scheme of the civil
rights movement. Rather than giving into anti-Groppi pressure, or turning in anger on his
South Side flock, he would implore that all people of good conscience join in fighting,
“the real enemy.” The real enemy, in his eyes, was an opaque blend of social, political,
and economic, apathies, inequalities, prejudices, and hatreds that had been festering in
Milwaukee for so long, and stood in the way of social justice for all people. In the wake
of the marches on his house, Cousins again took to the airwaves, declaring that, “Father
Groppi has become an issue himself. People are so disturbed by his actions that they lose
sight of the cause for which he is fighting—that of freedom and human dignity. As
Christians, we favor the same cause, but many are being sidetracked into a hate campaign
directed against one man.”53
Stephen Meyer, As Long as They Don’t Move Next Door (Lanham, Rowman & Littlefield
Publishers Inc, 2000), 193.
53
"Support for Ajax," Time Magazine (22 September 1967)
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article0,9171,837329,00.html (accessed 6 March, 2007).
52
30
Still, there was a backlash. Time magazine voiced that Groppi had “infuriated,”
Milwaukee Catholics and shed some light on the difficulties the Archbishop was up
against. “In recent weeks, however, Cousins has admitted that he has been under strong
pressure to discipline Groppi; the chancery office has been besieged with hate letters and
telephone calls; some Catholics have quit the church, while others have organized a
campaign to withhold contributions.”54 This hostile response was hardly surprising.
Cousin’s progressive leadership style had been a mixed blessing; his de-emphasis on his
own authority had created an atmosphere in which angry Catholics were, if not
comfortable, certainly capable of, defying his civil rights positions.
Clearly, the July riot had changed everything. Because of the lawlessness,
conservatives could argue that in opposing Groppi, they were not so much opposing civil
rights as defending law and order, protecting the peace. In doing so, they could cite
Police reports in which officers alleged that only a few months prior to the riot, Fr.
Groppi got into an altercation with police. Police claimed they saw Groppi “throw
punches and kick at officers and yelled ‘Start the riot!’”55 Furthermore, angry
demonstrations had been unknown in the South Side until Groppi began marching there.
Cousins, Groppi, and the civil rights movement at large, would have to press on into the
fall of 1967, with the long-hot summer, and especially Milwaukee’s July riot, hanging
from their necks like the proverbial albatross. The violence of July/August had nearly
proved to be a crippling blow to the civil rights movement. Fair or not, the open housing
marches and the riot were being viewed as opposite sides of the same coin.
54
55
Ibid.
Ratkowski, 45.
31
Chapter V-Milwaukee’s Inferno
It should come as no surprise that amidst the intense, racially charged,
divisiveness of 1967 Milwaukee, even loud and angry words were at times drowned-out,
by something even uglier and far more tangible, violence. The two incarnations of this
were the riot in the city’s Core, and the response to Groppi’s open housing marches a few
weeks later. Both the civil rights movement, and the whites attempting to persevere the
status quo on the South Side, faced at the very least, catastrophic embarrassment, due to
angry and impetuous people who had little trouble between taking rhetoric, twisting it a
bit, and translating it into grim realities.
It is hardly surprising that the first of Milwaukee’s ethnic enclaves to erupt into
violence was the all black Core on the North Side, which, after decades of political,
economic, and social, marginalization, had become a veritable tinder-box. A 1968 study
of the riot, by the Milwaukee Urban League, identified the main causes for the riot the
previous year. 75% of those arrested cited “anger with police,” 65% of them also attested
to anger over “racial discrimination in employment,” and 68% emphasized “racial
discrimination in housing.”56
Research done regarding the opinions of whites is also quite telling. The Urban
League studied the judgments of whites arrested during the riot, the majority of who were
arrested for carrying a weapon and/or violating the curfew. It is not clear from the
surveys if the white arrestees had armed themselves out of fear and in the name of selfdefense, or rather, had taken to a sort of “John Wayne” vigilante mentality. A police radio
communiqué from the height of the rioting may shed some light on the motivations of
56
Karl Flaming, Who “riots” and why? Black and white perspectives in Milwaukee (Milwaukee:
Milwaukee Urban League, 1968), 47.
32
some declaring that, “Two white-males with rifles in the 2900 block of North.”
Irregardless of the reasons behind being taken, white attitudes were very different from
those of black arrestees. Nearly a fourth of white arrestees and the white control
population surveyed, believed that “outsiders” possibly even communists, had a hand in
agitating the North Side violence. A significant percentage of whites further blamed
“civil rights people,” and a “lack of strong black local leadership.” The biggest culprit
though according to both white arrestees and a white control group was “the failure of
(black) parents to control their children.”57
Perhaps the most disturbing information to come out of the extensive post-riot
study was that 54% of black arrestees felt that, “Negroes have more to gain…by resorting
to violence in the civil rights movement.”58 The most troubling data collected from the
white surveys was that overwhelmingly the white community’s solution to race concerns
was “more police power,” police power being the very thing that had enraged so many
blacks to begin with! In essence, many blacks felt they had nothing left to loose and
violent militancy was the future of the civil rights movement, while many whites, rather
then addressing the root causes of trouble in the core preferred to treat only the symptoms
with an even stronger police presence.
Police, government, civil rights leaders, and the community at large all knew a
riot was coming. Throughout the summer of 1967, police noted that any cooperation or
communication with North Side blacks had come to a halt. Conversely rumors, tips, and
warnings from white residents; stories of strange cars, mysterious meetings, black storeowners hiding merchandise, and shadowy outsiders being seen around the city, reached a
57
58
Flaming, 48.
Ibid.
33
fever pitch. In May, a nun assigned to a parochial school on the North Side contacted
police and on the condition of anonymity, warned that Fr. Groppi was a threat to law and
order. Later that month, Hugh O’Connell, the district attorney issued a press release
which further ratcheted up the climate of fear.
O’Connell wrote that he had received information from three NAACP Youth
Council Members that, “A map had been drawn up showing the areas where the riot
would take place. It was decided that homes of certain public officials would be bombed
by Molotov cocktails.” The youths had gone on to warn the DA that Groppi was present
at the meetings and “was encouraging a riot.”59 As soon as O’Connell’s statement hit the
press, the three youths in question retracted their statements, but the damage had been
done. Shortly thereafter, three vacant houses in the Core went up in flames. Police and
fire officials suspected Molotov Cocktails and began surveillance of Groppi. Groppi’s
“Commandos” responded by upping the ante and bricking detective cars seen tailing the
priest.60 Cold-War style tensions had taken hold, relations between black residents and
police had become dangerously adversarial.
On the surface, a riot may seem like an utterly spontaneous orgy of destruction
and violence. In reality, the race riots of the 1960’s; to an extent fit a similar pattern. Like
Shakespearian tragedies, the actors, the locations, and the plot, may allow for some
degree of variations, but the formula was the same. In Milwaukee, police, press, citizens,
and rioters themselves had difficulty pin-pointing an event that was the exact cause of the
riot. It turned out to be a trivial and arbitrary event. The night of July, 29-30, “a police
sergeant came upon a fight in the street between two Negro women.” Youths in the
59
60
Ratkowski, 58.
Ratkowski, 59.
34
vicinity then turned on the officer, back-up was brought in, and curses lobed at the police
turned into bottles and rocks. Police commanders ordered patrols into blackneighborhoods doubled.61 In the wake of this, rumors of a coming confrontation spread
through the Core like wildfire. Throughout the North Side, reports came in of vandalism,
small fires, looting, and menacing groups of youths roaming the streets. Like a bizarre
game of “whack-a-mole” it seemed that as soon as police responded to one disturbance
reports of another would come in. Anarchy had set in, the riot had begun.
Myron Ratkowski, a Milwaukee police officer who played an active role in
combating the riot maintained that, “our officers were aware of the seriousness of the
situation and cautioned themselves not to trigger the crowd into unlawful acts…no one
has been able to find any single incident where police could be held responsible or
blamed for the actions of the crowd.”62 Still, while police may have intended to remain
stoic and professional, they were on edge. A combat-mindset had taken hold among the
cops, Ratkowski writes about his efforts to “secure weapons for the troops out on the
street. Formalities, judicial process, and protocol went out the window as we sniffed out
and located the cache of firearms such as rifles and shotguns.” 63 Police officers, armed
only with obsolete World War I era .38 caliber revolvers, quickly assembled a formidable
arsenal, commandeering rifles and shotguns from cooperative sporting goods stores and
metamorphosing from officers of the peace to a paramilitary force.
It was impossible for police to decipher which people out on the streets were
eager to riot, which were opportunists waiting to take advantage of the chaos and loot,
and which were simply part of the great throng of curious onlookers, who had been
61
Ratkowski, 59.
Ratkowski, 65.
63
Ratkowski, 64.
62
35
bombarded with riot hype and hysteria for so long and who had heard every possible
perspective on riots, everything from that they were the means to liberation over the
system to that they were shameful, self-destructive exercises in futility. Either way, many
young Core residents were not about to miss their chance to see the actual embodiment of
the idea that had possessed the city like a demon for months.
Mayor Maier and police Chief Harold Brier teamed up to put their meticulous riot
battle-plan into action. Brier had initially promised that Milwaukee cops could contain
the riot however, “At 2:00 A.M, when he got word that several of his men had been shot
by a ‘sniper,’ he changed his mind. On the chief’s advice, the mayor at once declared a
state of emergency and asked the governor to send in the National Guard.”64 Even with
troops on the way though, Brier was determined that the Milwaukee Police Department
would take the lead in squashing the riot.
Still, even for a veteran cop, the prospect of entering a riot zone can be horrifying.
On those four summer nights of violence in Milwaukee, the air would have been thick
with the smoke of burning buildings mingled with tear-gas. Rocks, bottles, and bricks
would have been flying indiscriminately. Factor in the exhaustion of officers whose shifts
should have ended hours prior and those who had been called out of their homes in the
middle of the night to respond, knowing the anxiety and fear their loved ones were
grappling with, no doubt recalling that officers fell in Detroit. The sounds of sirens and
taunting mobs provided a constant din only to be shattered by sporadic gun-fire. The
rules of engagement were hazy and it was nearly impossible to differentiate between the
curious and the malicious gathering in ever increasing numbers on the streets. Groups of
angry young blacks would swell in number and march down the avenues; some would be
64
Ibid.
36
breaking windows and starting fires. Police were stretched thin trying to respond to
dozens of rumors and false alarms of rapes, robberies, and sniper attacks. At least one
sniper was indeed active though at one point during the riots, killing an officer standing
in the glow of a street light, with a high-powered round, and even firing on Chief Brier’s
command post; Brier immediately ordered that electricity to the area be cut off.65 Radio
messages from the first, and worst, night of the riot, hint at the fearsome and confusing
situation officers found themselves in.
“12:46 a.m. We've got a large group of punks who need some attention…
2:03 a.m. Send ambulance. One dead already. Send ambulance. 134 W. Center. Man shot
in head by sniper…
2:10 a.m. Second and Center. Tear gas and ambulance. We're shooting at house…
2:15 a.m. Request for ambulances to stand by. Fourth and Garfield. Ambulance, Second
and Center, hurry, hurry.”
“Mayor Henry Maier began a 10-day curfew and called in 4,800 National Guard
troops with armored vehicles. The disturbance resulted in 3 deaths, 70 injuries…and
worsened interracial conditions.”66 Indeed, the mayor and the police took draconian
measures to subdue the disturbance. All gas stations, bars, and sporting good stores were
ordered closed indefinitely almost immediately, and even with the four day long
disturbance quelled, the city remained a ghost own, under curfew for several more days.
The National Guard barricaded the Core and patrolled the streets. Suburban police
65
Ratkowski, 113.
Wisconsin Cartographers’ Guild, 78.
66
37
departments prevented anyone from entering or leaving Milwaukee. 1,740 people were
arrested during this period, mostly for violating the curfew.67
Among them was none other than Fr. James Groppi, who steadfastly declared that
he had nothing to do with the riot yet proved to be his own worse enemy with his
increasingly apocalyptic comments on race relations. “Father James Groppi, the militant
civil rights leader…announced ‘this is not a riot, it’s a revolt.”68 In the end, however, the
riot had nothing to do with the mainstream civil rights movement. Any participants in the
violence who saw it as such were tragically misguided. The anger and rage of the rioters
at large essentially wreaked havoc on their own community, with “the Urban League
headquarters, the Black Muslim Temple, and twelve storefront Negro Churches,” being
among the buildings taking heavy damage.69
Within weeks of the riot, Groppi and the Commandos began organizing their
campaign of open housing marches; the timing could not have been worse, or better,
depending on one’s perspective. As the long hot summer gave way to fall, the mayor, the
police, Church leaders, and city residents were all on edge with one question dominating
their thoughts, who was Father James Groppi? Was he a peaceful crusader for social
justice, a violent and divisive revolutionary, an egotistical glory-hound, or just an
ordinary man who saw injustice and could not stay silent? Did the civil rights movement
seek to “over-come” or “over-run?” The answers to these questions would lay not in the
broken glass and burnt houses of the Core, but rather on the other side of the 16h Street
Viaduct, the symbol of Milwaukee’s segregation and the “longest bridge” in the world.
67
Boesel and Rossi, 105.
Ibid.
69
Boesel and Rossi, 103.
68
38
CHAPTER VI- A Bridge Too Far?
South Siders would have been able to hear the chaos, the sirens and gunshots, of
the riot, and yet, the events across the river may-as-well have been a world away. If there
was any doubt for those residents that the civil rights movement was synonymous with
trouble, it was dashed. When word came of Groppi’s plan to lead the Commandos out of
the Core, and instead of protesting authorities, march against the ordinary people, panic
set in. “The residents there were not able to adapt to different conditions, the status quo
being the rule,” and they were determined to defend it to the bitter end.70
In addition to fears, real and imagined, of implementing change, lawlessness, and
destruction of community, South Siders felt unfairly targeted by Groppi’s latest
campaign. Mayor Maier, whose legitimate passion for urban reform had been jaded by
the riots and Groppi’s publicity, vocalized their concerns. “Fearing further loss of the
city’s tax base, he insisted that Milwaukee could not enact anti-discrimination legislation
unless suburban communities and the county followed suit.” Maier asked, “Wouldn’t it
be logical to have open housing in the suburbs to absorb some of the poor?”71 Looming
behind these remarks is the fact that he was up for reelection in 1968, and civic minded
South Siders voted in droves. Of course, while South Siders may have, to an extent,
represented the promise of America, in that a once oppressed immigrant group had risen
to some degree of prosperity, and the blue-collar Catholics were hardly the primary
culprit for Milwaukee’s racial issues, their record and motives were hardly immaculate.
70
Ratkowski, 167.
Stephen Meyer, As Long As they Don’t Move Next Door (New York: Rowman & Littlefield
Publishers, Inc., 2000), 190.
71
39
Milwaukee’s lone African-American alderman, Vel Philips had tried,
unsuccessfully, on four occasions, to pass an open-housing ordinance.72 It had not gone
unnoticed by civil rights activists that the strongest opposition came from the PolishAmerican aldermen who, “for years steadfastly refused to permit any public housing on
the all-white South Side.”73 Thus, in addition to the instinct to preserve a tight-knit and
respected, ethnic and religious community, there were other, more contemptible, factors
in opposition to open housing. The working-class South Siders had a lot invested, both
financially, and in terms of personal pride, in their homes. To them, the arrival of any
blacks in their territory presented a, “there goes the neighborhood” scenario. There was a
great financial stake in preventing integration of South Side.
Poles had been late comers to the American experience, and of all the groups in
Milwaukee, had been the most recent to emerge triumphant from the grimly oft-repeated
fight with blacks to avoid being consigned to the bottom wrung of American society.
Polish opposition to civil rights was, in this respect, different from that of southern
WASPs, whose society had traditionally demanded deference from blacks and had
suppressed them with Jim Crowe laws and the Klan. Poles did not see blacks as the
descendants of slaves who needed to be put in their place, but rather, as potential rivals in
the job market, a latent threat to property values, and an impending harbinger of the
decline of community, law, and order. In adopting such views, they had gained sympathy
for the ideals of southern-segregationists.
In 1964, Poles had, in large numbers, backed segregationist candidate George
Wallace, much to the embarrassment of the Wisconsin Democratic establishment. In one
Wisconsin Cartographers’ Guild. , 78.
Thomas Sanders, “The Milwaukee Marcher,”
https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/sammann/Archive_Vol_9.doc?uniq=epwjz1(accessed 26 March, 2007).
72
73
40
of the most bizarre examples of cultural diffusion in American politics, throngs of South
Siders sang Dixie in Polish to Wallace on his campaign swing through their area.74
Wallace returned the warm feelings declaring that “if he lived outside of Alabama, he
would choose the South Side.”75
In response to white fears in the wake of the riot, and in defiance of black opinion,
within a matter of days, Chief Brier took the initiative in creating an elite paramilitary
group of officers, the new outfit was dubbed the Tactical Enforcement Unit, but everyone
knew it as the “TAC Squad.” Heavily armed TAC teams would be “almost invincible and
incapable of being defeated.”76 TAC would be mobile, aggressive, and geared towards
nipping anything resembling a riot in the bud. While the presence of TAC Squad roaming
the streets, like avenging marshals out to clean up the Wild West was comforting to many
white residents, blacks and liberals were infuriated. The ACLU, the Black Panthers,
NAACP, and the Urban League all registered their disgust.77 In addition to the dubious
necessity of around-the-clock riot watch, TAC Squad was to respond to any and all
violent crimes in the city. Additionally, TAC, led Sgt. Frank Miller, set out on a crusade
to police morality. They cracked down on vagrancy, panhandling, intoxication, pot, lewd
and lascivious behavior, prostitution, and unmarried cohabitation with great zeal.
Miller’s hard-charging style was popular with white residents but earned him the
disdain of a loose group that gruff police veteran Ratkowski described as “civil rights
marchers, anti-war activists, East-Side radicals and the under-ground newspaper the
74
Richard Haney “Wallace in Wisconsin: The Presidential Primary of 1964,” Wisconsin Magazine
of History, 61 (1978): 259-267.
75
Ibid.
76
Ratkowski, 106.
77
Ratkowski, 111.
41
Kaleidoscope, along with a variety of 60’s hippies and sex perverts.”78 TAC Squad was
the iron-fist of conservative Milwaukeeans who were mad-as-Hell about affronts to the
status quo and were not going to take it anymore. In an ultimate display of irony
however, the bulk of TAC Squad’s energy was quickly diverted from the campaign
against “perverts,” hippies, and civil rights radicals, and turned against its own base of
support, the traditionalist South Siders. After Groppi’s first march to the area, it became
clear that only TAC would be capable of maintaining order on the South Side. Officer
Miller and Father Groppi, two men with nothing but disdain for each other, found
themselves in the uncomfortable position of having their fates entwined.
The marchers, ranging in number from 20 to 650, and accompanied by TAC,
adopted a routine ritual. They would rally at St. Boniface parish where Groppi would
give them a religious pep-talk and then set off south through the black neighborhoods.
The route took them past the mostly sympathetic territory of Marquette University and to
the bridge, the 16h Street Viaduct, which spanned the entire Menomonee River Valley.
The sidewalks on both sides of the bridge were sometimes so thick with hecklers that the
Commandos would march in the road; this was just a preview of what awaited them on
the other side. The march would take them across, or at times down, Mitchell Street, the
“Polish Downtown.” Banners on places of business warned the marchers, “Niggers &
Clergy! Pray for Forgiveness!” and “Niggers…Fix Up Your Homes and Yards.”79 The
route meandered past churches where outdoor icons and statues of Polish kings and saints
watched in silence and where people had prayed that Fr. Groppi be disciplined by
78
79
Ratkowski, 119.
Milwaukee Journal, 16 September, 1967, p.1.
42
Cousins. Finally they would reach, their destination, Kosciusko Park, in the shadow of St.
Josephat’s basilica, the two landmarks being the very heart of Polish Milwaukee.
On August 29, 1967, the statue in the park of General Kosciusko himself,
mounted and brandishing a saber, seemed to lead the multitude of opposition. Up to
13,000 people had gathered in the park, burning Groppi in effigy and chanting
“kill…kill…kill”!80 Sometimes Groppi and company would make it to the park, and he
would stand on a picnic table and give a speech, this time though, opposition, in the form
of bricks, bottles, rocks, and firecrackers, was so intense, that even TAC Squad feared for
their lives and the 200 marchers turned around, vowing to return tomorrow. During that
second, and most frightening, of the marches, the entire procession was chased out of the
South Side, not safe until they reached the bridge where TAC was able to set up a
perimeter to hold back the hordes with raised shotguns and teargas. Even the North Side
offered no safety though; a white Chevrolet passed by, firebombed Youth Council
Headquarters and sped off.81 The Commandos snapped and unfairly blamed the police
resulting in a desperate melee. While TAC had been vilified as an occupying force in the
Core, the officers had saved their lives, bearing the brunt of the bricks and bottles,
ensuring their right to free-expression. Giving credit where it was due, Groppi did
“acknowledge the good work and protection given them by the police.”82 Future marches
would be harrowing and dangerous, but never would the peak of terror that was seen on
August 29 be surpassed.
Opponents of integration, seeking to retain some level of respectability, realized
that the atmosphere they had cultivated was creating a monster. Any moral high-ground
80
Meyer, 191.
Ibid.
82
Ratkowski, 129.
81
43
and political capital that anti-open housing forces had gained in the wake of the North
Side riot was squandered. The mayor and South Side leaders had gambled that they
would be able turn anger on Groppi almost exclusively, in contradiction to everything the
Archbishop had said about fighting “the real enemy.” Their blame Groppi argument even
resonated from the halls of congress where Clem Zablocki who represented the South
Side, claimed that his district was “not so much anti-Negro as anti-Groppi.”83
Still, in addition to a scathing condemnation of the counter-protesters by
Archbishop Cousins on TV and in Catholic newspapers, the Milwaukee Journal weighed
in that the counter-protests were indeed racially motivated, asserting that, “The shameful
bigotry shown by whites…was a rejection of everything Americans and Christians should
stand for. The sight of children with their parents joining in chants of hate was enough to
sicken decent people.”84 Just as Fr. Witon had had to learn how to walk the frightfully
fine-line between rallying the neighborhood to defense of home and parish and keeping
racist elements marginalized, South Side aldermen, the long-time bulwark against openhousing, found themselves in the same precarious position. Six of them wrote letters to
the parochial schools imploring that school authorities and parents establish a 9:00 p.m.
curfew for teenagers, whose hot-headed antics, especially disregard for the authority of
the police, was bringing shame to the neighborhood.85
The mayor however had his own curfew plan in mind to restore order. For the
second time in three months, a state-of-emergency was established in Milwaukee and
Mayor Maier, in the name of restoring order, “declared a thirty-day moratorium on night
83
Support for Ajax," Time Magazine (22 September 1967)
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article0,9171,837329,00.html (accessed 6 March, 2007).
84
Meyer, 192.
85
Milwaukee Journal, 15 September 1967 p.1.
44
demonstrations.”86 Groppi, ill from exhaustion, protested the ban, and a police-double
standard, both of which had been aimed at suppressing the civil rights activists. To be
sure, when blacks had rioted in July, the authorities had brought the hammer down on
them, when South Side whites showed the same tendencies towards lawlessness and
violence, police had shown far greater leniency in terms of arrests.
Under pressure from the ACLU, NAACP, and amidst rumors that Martin Luther
King himself would join Groppi in a march, the mayor backed down on the curfew. King
never came, but he did send Fr. Groppi a supportive letter, which said, among other
things, that, the young priest was, “willing to stand up for righteousness sake and you are
motivated by a deep commitment to Christianity.”87
Media scorn, and even condemnation from Archbishop Cousins, had been unable
to put a stop to South Side counter-demonstrations. Moral was low on the police force,
but the men of TAC were professionals and were going to be there to protect the
marchers as long as the demonstrations continued. It was apparent to all that Mayor
Meyer was going to drag his feet on open housing until state or federal action was taken
on the matter, as had been his hope all along. As for Fr. Groppi, despite the threats,
assaults, curses, and criticism being fired at him, to say nothing of nearing complete
exhaustion, the radical priest vowed the marches would continue for “five more years,” if
need be.88 There was no reason to suspect he was anything but dead-serious. At last,
under growing pressure from businessmen, worried that the image of racism and violence
was hurting the city’s economy, Meyer and the council begrudgingly agreed to form a
86
Meyer, 192.
Thomas Sanders, “The Milwaukee Marcher,”
https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/sammann/Archive_Vol_9.doc?uniq=epwjz1(accessed 26 March, 2007).
88
Meyer, 196.
87
45
panel to examine the issue, though the mayor opined that Milwaukee, “should never,
never, have allowed this matter to be placed this high on the city’s agenda."89
The panel consisted of five aldermen, including Vel Philips who had marched
with Groppi on a few occasions. Also represented was one of the Commandos, Lawrence
Friend, as well as business, labor, and real estate interests. The Church was also
represented, but not by Groppi.90 The eleven member panel debated the issue hotly over
the course of a weekend, concluding with a grueling 19 hour session. Eventually, an open
housing ordinance was adopted, but it was a hollow victory. The bill put forth had taken a
suggestion from the mayor and exempted “owner-occupied single-family homes.” Thus,
while on paper Milwaukee was now ready to be desegregated, in reality, nearly everyone
on the South Side lived in exempted houses. The odds that the same people who had
rallied in the thousands to prevent civil rights marchers from entering their neighborhood
would sell there homes to blacks were slim at best. Dismayed by the result, Phillips
retorted to the panel, “Thanks for nothing.”91
During the lull provided by the panel’s deliberations, South Siders changed
tactics, and the “respectable” forces of status quo such as the Milwaukee Citizens Civic
Voice (MCCV), which had, heading Fr. Witon’s advice, dropped the name, Milwaukee
Organization of Closed Housing, reclaimed their position of leadership in opposing civil
rights from the bottle throwing, adherents of their cause. They began a major petition
drive for a referendum that would put a two-year freeze on any changes in housing. It
never made it to the ballot, “The ACLU fought it in court, and a month after its victory
89
Meyer, 195.
Ibid.
91
Meyer, 196.
90
46
the issue became moot: Congress enacted a national fair-housing law.”92 Milwaukee’s
last epic civil rights march would occur in April 1968, in memory of Martin Luther King,
15,000 people of all races participated.93
92
93
Ibid.
Wisconsin Cartographers’ Guild, 78.
47
Chapter VII- Conclusion: The Most Segregated City
On the South Side, the Poles are mostly gone now and the neighborhood has
transformed in ways unanticipated in 1967. These changes are best seen in the parishes
that had been the heart of community identity to the Poles. While one may be hard
pressed to find a Polish speaker in the congregation these days, Masses are celebrated in
English, Vietnamese, and most commonly of all, in Spanish. For all intents and purposes,
many of the churches are in line with the old ethnic-parish model. In a nod to the
conservative brand of Catholicism that continues to holds sway in the area, St. Stanislaus
Church still offers the Tridentine Mass in Latin as per the 1962 rubrics. The white
community which has since mostly left the area for the suburbs has consistently
responded with generosity to financial appeals from the churches their forefathers built
thus they are all still well attended, and well kept.
On the southern wall of St. Stanislaus, the first Polish church in Milwaukee, is a
large, ornate, mosaic of Our Lady of Czestochowa, the “Queen of Poland.” Walking the
streets though, it is clear that the Polish version of the Madonna has been supplanted by
her Latin American alter-ego. Statues of Our Lady of Guadalupe are seen in many of the
little yards, and images of her are attached to signs taped to front doors forewarning
Mormon proselytizers that “Este Hogar Es Catolico” (this home is Catholic) keep away!
While the demographics have shifted considerably, it seems that on the South Side,
indeed, some things never change.
The inner city parishes, which Fr. Groppi and like-minded priests once viewed as
vehicles of social change have faded into memory. Groppi’s parish of St. Boniface, the
point of embarkation for the famous marches, no longer exists. In the early 1990’s the
48
inner-core parishes were merged, in response to a shortage of priests and declining
attendance. Groppi himself eventually left the priesthood due to disillusionment and
married his secretary. A letter written by a sympathetic priest in 1967 proved to be quite
prophetic, noting that, “His fellow Catholics, priests, and law enforcers have given him
no reason to restrain from total alienation and rebellion…Father Groppi hasn’t alienated
himself from this community. This community has pushed him against the wall.”94
Groppi gave serious thought to converting and becoming an Episcopal priest, but after
much soul-searching, he decided that he could leave the priesthood, but never the
Catholic Church. With the age of radicalism and civil rights conflicts quickly fading into
the past, Groppi fell from the public eye, returning to his old job as a bus-driver to
support his wife and young daughters. True to form, he became the head of the bus
drivers’ union. He died in 1985, a sickly and exhausted man.95
After hearing word of Groppi’s Las Vegas wedding and abandonment of the
priesthood in 1976, TAC Squad commander Frank Miller lamented, tongue-in-cheek, to
the papers about not being asked to be the best-man, writing that, “I thought he and I
were close friends. After all, I did save him from being thrown over the 16th Street
Viaduct on many occasions when he decided to invade Kosciusko Park with his
Commandos on those very hairy nights when we both stood a chance of not coming out
alive again.”96 During an award for heroism ceremony, in his acceptance speech, the
tough-as-nails sergeant lamented, “being depicted as a sadistic, head beating cop, being
Thomas Sanders, “The Milwaukee Marcher,”
https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/sammann/Archive_Vol_9.doc?uniq=epwjz1(accessed 26 March, 2007).
95
Ratkowski, 164.
96
Ratkowski, 157.
94
49
called a pig,” and the effect this had on his family.97 Myron Ratkowski left Milwaukee in
1971 and took a job as chief of police in the suburb of Greendale; in retirement, he
became a tireless advocate and apologist on behalf of police officers and dedicated
himself to getting the “truth” out about Groppi. His account of the Milwaukee civil rights
movement, while biased, to this day remains the only comprehensive, commercially
published, monograph dedicated entirely to the topic.
Mayor Maier remains a popular figure in Milwaukee history and his bellicose
approach to Groppi in 1967 has not sullied his image as a sincere advocate of urban
reform. In retirement he wrote, “As for Groppi and the Journal, I believe both were guilty
of spiritual violence at a time when the city needed peace after the civil disorders. Groppi
was the newspaper’s tool to avert calling upon the suburbs for any significant effort to
ameliorate central city problems in the aftermath of the riots. The paper took refuge
behind Groppi’s central-city-only open housing marches.”98 It was against Maier’s
objections that the 16th Street Viaduct was renamed the, “James E. Groppi Unity Bridge.”
Archbishop Cousins passed away in 1988. “While Cousins’ involvement in the
civil rights movement may seem minimal, it was actually quite helpful. Groppi’s actions
caused the usually quiet Archbishop to choose sides, and the influential leader chose to
support the Civil Rights movement.”99 In many ways, he was the unsung hero of the era,
a respected voice for peace and justice that more than once cooled the fires of hate and
rage blazing in Milwaukee. His public denunciations of both the North Side Riot and
South Side protests, his effort to garner unified support for civil rights from clergy and
97
Ratkowski, 124.
Ratkowski, 158.
99
Thomas Sanders, “The Milwaukee Marcher,”
https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/sammann/Archive_Vol_9.doc?uniq=epwjz1(accessed 26 March, 2007).
98
50
laity alike, as well as his risky defense of the radical Fr. Groppi and ability to call
attention to the real problems afflicting Milwaukee, were tantamount to piloting a ship
through a frightful hurricane. One can only wonder what the state of race relations in
Milwaukee would be today had Cousins not been there to take the young priest in under
his wing and if a cleric of Fr. Witon or Bishop Atkielski’s anti-Groppi convictions had
been in a similar position of influence.
As for Milwaukee, with exceptions, the bulk of the black community still resides
in the Core where violent crime is high and standard of living lags. Milwaukee Public
Schools have one of the highest drop-out rates in the nation and the city is often dubbed
the “Most Segregated,” in America. As the mayor predicted, open-housing spurred whiteflight to the suburbs and now Milwaukee is a “majority-minority” city, hemmed in by
white suburbs. In light of this, one may be tempted to say, pragmatically speaking, that
the civil rights movement in Milwaukee and Groppi in particular, failed. This however
would paint an incomplete picture. The marches may not have desegregated the South
Side, but their impact was far-reaching: “The Milwaukee movement showed that northern
blacks, like their southern counterparts, could carry out a campaign of civil disobedience
without it turning into an anarchic and destructive riot.”100
In other words, Milwaukee had been a testing ground for similar tactics to be used
in other cities across the country. Also, in provoking rage and violence from South
Siders, deep seeded prejudiced emotions were brought out into the public square, for
scrutiny and condemnation. In the end, it was the opponents of open housing, rather than
its supporters, who took on the image of dangerous rabble-rousers. The marches had
forced Milwaukee to acknowledge something that was so apparent but unspoken in the
100
Meyer, 196.
51
past, the city had a major race problem. Without such acknowledgment, no solutions
would ever be possible.
In the end, perhaps what was most memorable about the turmoil of Milwaukee
civil rights movement was Father Groppi himself. The site of a Roman collar around the
neck of a civil rights marcher awoke the consciences of Catholics nationwide to their
responsibilities towards their fellow man. Prominently standing out however, enabled
supporters of the status-quo to make Groppi into a scapegoat. They could attack his
efforts without going on the record as against civil rights. This failure to fight the “real
enemy,” the root causes of race problems, and instead blame the messengers, the
marchers, and repress the symptoms with law enforcement, prevented the 1960’s from
fundamentally transforming Milwaukee.
When the hate-mail poured in, when the glass bottles struck him, and the
politicians and police railed against him; any privilege, respect, or status Groppi would
have had as white-man, and a man-of-the-cloth, evaporated. Despite being of a different
race than his Commandos, Groppi had shared every tribulation of the marches with them,
and lived the African American experience in a way few other whites could. He had
shown that whites and blacks could work together in the movement at a time when it was
in danger of becoming increasingly militant and separatist. Fr. Groppi had taken the lead
in helping young blacks channel righteous anger at a failing city and system, into a
tireless and mostly peaceful campaign for social justice. Father Groppi did not solve
Milwaukee’s race problems, but he did not create ones that did not already exist, and he
did not ignore them or sugar-coat them either. His marches, as long as they were, may
only have been the first steps, but they were also the hardest, and most profound.
52
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